Shortly after being taken on as court painter, architect, and engineer for the archbishops of Mainz in 1511, Grünewald painted the repellent and unforgettable Isenheim Altar.

The altar was commissioned for a monastic hospital, the order of St. Anthony of Isenheim, and the exaggerated suffering of Christ was considered a fitting subject to be viewed by mortally ill patients and hardened doctors. Indeed, those who knew real suffering would not be comforted by a serene abstraction of the torture of crucifixion.